DHARAN, July 5: The vote counting at Dharan Sub-metropolitan City that was halted since Monday midnight has not resumed yet.
The political parties have not arrived at consensus to resume the vote counting that remained stalled following the pressure by CPN (Maoist Center) and Federal Socialist Forum Nepal (FSFN).
Pasting a notice outside the counting center, the returning officer said that the counting will remain stalled until further notice as the efforts to settle the dispute did not strike any deal yesterday.
Vote count resumes after 4 hours in Dharan Sub-metropolitan Cit...
The dispute started after a vote cast for Federal Socialist Forum Nepal (FSFN) candidate was found to have been added to the votes of Marxist Leninist candidate while verifying the counting just before it was formally announced.
No sooner the incident came to the fore than the Maoist Center and FSFN cadres started protesting against the vote counting.
Chief Election Officer, Chief District Officer and District Police Officer had arrived at Sabhagriha after the dispute cropped up at the counting center in Dharan on Tuesday.
As many as nine parties including FSFN and Maoist Center had formed an electoral alliance to contest the local elections in Dharan Sub-metropolitan City on June 28.
The dispute began when the counting update was about to be made public after the counting of ward no. 9 and 10 was over.
With the vote counting up to ward no. 8 over, Nepali Congress has won in wards 1, 2 and 5 while UML has won in wards 3, 4, 6, 7 and 8.
